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Saturday, August 12, 2017

For well over a decade, it has been increasingly difficult to find
issues on which Republicans and Democrats can agree, but this is one:
Since 2000, there has been a strong bipartisan consensus — in Congress
and the White House — that increasing economic engagement with Africa
furthers our country’s strategic, financial, political and humanitarian
objectives.

This widely-held belief has led to many years of advances for all sides.
Unfortunately, this progress may be about to grind to a halt, and the
catalyst will probably surprise most people: it’s the articles of used
clothing that millions of us donate annually to charitable
organizations, generally with the understanding that they will go to
needy Americans or be resold in second-hand stores around the United
States.

Instead, a thriving industry in America is reaping the financial rewards
of routinely selling tons of these hand-me-downs in East Africa. That’s
problematic for a number of reasons. Most critically, it undermines the
efforts of “receiving” nations to jump-start their own garment sectors —
which, it’s important to point out, are often the means by which women
escape from dire poverty in what is already the world’s poorest region.

Both parties understood these realities when Congress passed the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA)
of 2000, which became the centerpiece of U.S. policy toward sub-Saharan
Africa by changing the economic engagement model from one based on
American aid to a trade-and-investment approach in which commerce and
respect for African nations’ own development needs became paramount. In
practice, it aims to benefit all parties by removing U.S. import duties
on virtually all goods produced or finished in the region.

Almost from the start, lobbyists for the trade association for used clothing resellers — called SMART, for Secondary Materials and Recycled Textiles — have tried upend AGOA.

Almost from the start, lobbyists for the trade association for used clothing resellers — called SMART, for Secondary Materials and Recycled Textiles — have tried upend AGOA. They
have argued that it costs American jobs (a claim with no evidence
behind it); hurts American charities (ditto); and could be bad for the
environment because usable clothing, if not resold in Africa, could wind
up in landfills (suggestion: give donated clothing to the needy instead
of profiting from it).

Republican and Democratic administrations alike have turned a deaf ear
to those claims, both because they are speculative, at best, and because
the mutual benefits of AGOA are so clear. Until now. In response to yet
another SMART petition, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative
(USTR) last month announced —
for the first time — that it would launch an “out-of-cycle” review of
whether to revoke the import duty waiver for Rwanda, Uganda, and
Tanzania in response to their announcement that they planned to phase
out the import of used clothing by 2019.

In its petition, the clothes-reselling organization alleges those three
nations are not complying with AGOA’s terms, which include making
“continual progress” on either “the elimination of barriers to US trade
and investment” or “economic policies to reduce poverty.”

The reality is more complicated, of course. In fact, what they are doing
is prioritizing the development of their domestic apparel industries,
while acknowledging there may indeed be some short-term compromises in
order to build a secure future; that is, one that not only serves the
long-term interests of their own people, but also creates a vibrant
market for high-value American goods — not just for our hand-me-downs.
Moreover, in focusing on their clothing industries, these nations are
creating an entry point for manufacturing that has been successfully
used for a very long time in very many places, from New England and the
American South to East Asia, Mexico, and the Caribbean.

Past U.S. trade representatives have made these nuanced realities a
central factor in past reviews of AGOA, and we strongly urge the current
one to do the same. Here are two additional points in support of
maintaining the regrettably rare, bipartisan status quo on this issue:

Even at a time when many people differ about what it means to put
“America First,” it’s important to stress that the clothes being resold
in East Africa may be shipped from the United States (and therefore may
appear to do good for our economy), but 97 percent of these garments or
their components are made in countries other than our own, especially
China.

A 2016 report by
the McKinsey Global Institute calculates that over the next decade,
spending by African consumers and businesses could reach $5.6 trillion,
with manufacturing output on that continent nearly doubling from $500
billion to $930 billion.

That’s quite a potential market for the United States, but there’s one
big caveat in the McKinsey analysis. The projected numbers will only be
achieved, it says, if “countries take decisive action to create an
improved environment for manufacturers.” So let’s stop flooding African
nations with our cast-offs or punishing them when they say, “No, thank
you.” Instead, let’s help to build that environment.